WP 1.1: Integrated carbon inventory and monitoring system

The extreme topography constitutes a special challenge for the development of a monitoring concept

Reliable estimation of carbon stock is the basis for the implementation of market mechanisms, such as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and REDD within the framework of the actual climate policy. Although there are different guidelines available for the assessment of carbon and CO2 equivalent (IPCC 2006, GOFC-GOLD 2009), no exact standards for the planning and implementation of inventories have been establised in this context yet. That lies mainly in the fact that the national circumstances are different from country to country and hence no general inventory instructions can be made.

In addition to carbon stock modeling based on terrestrial inventories, the application of remote sensing data always plays a big role for the availability of data over a large geographical area on the one hand and often restricted access to forests on the other hand. The integration of remote sensing data and terrestrial field survey becomes therefore a central research field. The new vegetation-optimized sensors, such as the Satellite System RapidEye, provide suitable databases, whose spectral signature must be examined with regard to its correlation with carbon stock. Extreme topography constitutes a special challenge.

The scientific and technical objectives are research question- and challenge-oriented:

Development ad optimization of integrated inventory approaches to assessing aboveground biomass and carbon